Alan Culpepper and Matt Lane

Alan Culpepper, coming off a strong 1-2 performance in Athens and Boston, and Matt Lane, making his debut, were both expecting better things Sunday at the Chicago Marathon. We caught up both of American's top male hopes outside the post-race press conference in the Hilton.

Runner's World Daily: Tell us about the early pace.Alan Culpepper: I was definitely disappointed with the first 2 miles. After that, I thought we were going to pick up the pace. That didn't happen. Then the third mile I started moving up to the front. At that point 5:05s felt incredibly slow. Then, all of a sudden it was like a switch went off. I ran two 4:45 miles and I got dropped. Right from the beginning it didn't set up well for me to get on pace. And after the pack went I was by myself. It took me a couple of miles to hook up with the Japanese runner. We helped each other to the end. I'm glad he was there.

RWD: Was there a point mid-race where you still had a glimmer of hope, in that a late-race charge, like Boston in the spring, was still in the cards?AC: Half-way I was still optimistic that if I stayed on pace I could run 2:09. Then we turned back into the wind. We started running 5:10s and we immediately started to go. I just didn't feel well. Even from the start. I felt depleted the whole way. I felt bad early. I'm not making a big excuse but I woke up Thursday with a head cold, not 100 percent. The last three days I tried to stay as positive as I could. And when the race started I knew I was going to be hurting sooner or later, I just wasn't expecting to run 5:10s with 10 miles to go.

RWD: Sum up and talk about the future for us.AC: I am certainly not excited about my performance. Of all the marathons I've run, I felt this one was my worst. I need to get back and work on some strength issues. Some of my stabilizing muscles. I felt like I was getting beat up. I could feel my hips, glutes, quads. What the heck. Ahhh. Right now a ton of things go through your head. I am certainly not thinking about another one of these, yet.

Matt Lane (14th in 2:17:31)

RWD: How was the wind out there?Matt Lane: The wind was definitely more of a factor than what I would like it to be. I felt like it was coming from a couple of different directions...like it was side or front. Never from the back.

RWD: And that affected the pace?ML: We were all over the place--in pace--because of the wind. Never really established a real solid rhythm at 5:06 pace. The pace as either way too fast or way too slow.

RWD: How did you race play out the last ten miles.ML: At 16 miles I broke off from Michael Aish, Craig Kurtwood and Paul Koech. I ran okay from there--5:05s and 5:08s for 5-K. Until 20 miles, then the 5:20s started. Then the 5:40s started. I don't even know what the last mile way. The last mile felt like it was 3000 meters.

RWD: What about your marathon future?ML: At the moment, I'm just thinking about whether my legs are going to stop aching. We'll deal with what's on the docket and go from there once I feel like I'm never going to take another step running--which will probably be some time tomorrow.